Walton collected his papers. The sergeant slipped her arms into her overcoat.
“Elspeth?”
She glanced at him. “Sir?”
“Sorry, just curious. About your name, I mean. Is it French, or what?”
“It’s British, captain. I was named after a great-aunt in London.”
“Cheerio and pip-pip, eh what? Elspeth, our mess is off limits to EMs, but as court secretary, I think we could shoe-horn you in.”
“Thank you, captain, but I’ve already made plans for lunch.”
“Well, suit yourself. Docker, if you’re tired of GI food, there’s a damn good brasserie, Le Chat qui Fum, near the flower market. That means ‘the cat who smokes.’ ”
“Hear, hear,” Docker said, and picked up his overcoat and left the ballroom.
“Surly bastard,” Lieutenant Weiffel said.
“He may have reason to be.” Walton looked at his watch. “Let’s chow up. Karsh said two o’clock.”
Docker had coffee and a sandwich at a riverside café, where old men in jackets over woolen sweaters stood at a zinc-topped bar drinking beer and brandy. When he returned to the ballroom of the Empire Hotel several minutes before two o’clock, Sergeant Corey was at her desk and the officers were seated at the conference table arranging their files and notes.
As Docker took his chair, Karsh said, “Lieutenant Weiffel? Do you have a question?”
“Yes, sir.”
Docker recognized the book opened in front of Weiffel as a U.S. Army Small-Arms Training Manual.
Weiffel said, “Lieutenant, in Private Farrel’s deposition, he states that he filed the sear off his M-1 rifle because you told him to. Is that right?”
“It wasn’t an order, sir. It was a suggestion.”
“Well, did you file the sear off your rifle? And if so, would you tell us why?”
“Yes. To convert it to full automatic.”
Weiffel leaned forward, a smooth roll of fat rising pinkly above his shirt collar, and put a finger on a paragraph of the Small-Arms Manual. With his other hand the lieutenant began stroking his soft scalp, a habit of his that struck Docker as curious because Weiffel always accompanied the gesture with an expression of surprise and alarm, as if he were freshly conscious of loss each time his hand strayed to his bald head. He said now, “I guess you know, lieutenant, that once you file that sear off, the rifle can’t be converted back to normal semiautomatic function?”
“I understand that, lieutenant.”
“By stretching of point, you could say that you destroyed government property without proper authority.”
“The purpose of making that modification was to get more firepower in the air.”
“And is that all that matters? The amount of ammo you can pump off?”
“Well, it sure as hell doesn’t do much good on the ground.”
“Lieutenant Docker,” Karsh said. “Some of these questions may strike you as irrelevant, but keep your answers pertinent and responsive. Is that clear?”
“Yes, major, but the lieutenant’s question made that kind of answer very difficult.”
Karsh nodded to Sergeant Corey. “Please read the last few exchanges.”
“Yes, sir.” She flipped back a page of her notebook and found the place with her pencil. “Lieutenant Weiffel’s question: ‘And is that all that matters? The amount of ammo you can pump off?’ Lieutenant Docker’s answer: ‘Well, it sure as hell doesn’t do much good on the ground.’ ”
“Thank you, sergeant... well, lieutenant, you may have a point, the query might be construed as ambiguous, but that wasn’t intentional—”
“Then I’ve got just one more question,” Weiffel said. “I’ll try to make it real clear. You say you didn’t order Private Farrel to file the sear off his rifle. But you suggested he do it. Have I got that straight now?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Lieutenant, did anyone order you to file the sear off your rifle?”
“No, sir.”
“Well, did someone suggest to you that you destroy government property?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Who, lieutenant? And under what circumstances?”
“After Kasserine, a colonel on the division commander’s staff advised us all to file the sears off our rifles. He made it clear he didn’t want to be quoted on the subject but I’ll identify him if you think it will shed light on these hearings.”
“No, that won’t be necessary,” Weiffel said, and looked uncertainly at the major.
Karsh said, “If the colonel preferred to remain anonymous, so be it. Captain Walton?”
The captain opened a folder and leafed through it. “I’d like to inquire into a certain issue raised by Lieutenant Bart Whitter.” He nodded to Sergeant Corey. “There’s an h in that name, sergeant, W-h-i-t-t-e-r.” Adjusting his glasses, Walton ran his finger across the open file. “Lieutenant Whitter states that the then-Sergeant Docker and other members of his gun section unlawfully appropriated fifty-five gallons of ethyl alcohol from Utah Beach in Normandy—” He stared at Docker. “That was just after the Allied landing in France last year. What’s your comment on this portion of Lieutenant Whitter’s deposition?”
“It’s not true, sir.”
“You mean the lieutenant is mistaken? Or that he’s lying?”
“Probably a little of both, sir.”
The major stared at him over the frames of his heavy glasses. “Try to be more specific, lieutenant.”
“Yes, sir. In the first place. Lieutenant Whitter wasn’t on Beach Red that day. He was on a reconnaissance inland with Captain Grant, and a check of our battery records will show that. Secondly, we didn’t appropriate anything, for the simple reason that it was impossible to steal anything from Utah Beach. There was only one rule the beachmasters enforced: empty trucks hit the beach, full trucks leave the beach. We didn’t have a full truck so we added those jerry cans of alcohol to our load of tents and camouflage nets. The beachmasters were screaming at us through bullhorns to clear out by then, which we were glad to do because the beach was under fire from German fighters and artillery. A stray shot would have turned us into a bonfire. I submit with respect, sir, that Lieutenant Whitter didn’t know what the hell happened on that day. So someone must have told him what happened. If he believes it’s true, he’s mistaken. If not, he’s lying.”
There was a reluctant admiration in Karsh’s smile. “You make a good case, lieutenant. But isn’t it true that your section never made any attempt to deliver that alcohol to a medical unit, or turn it over to your own supply sergeant?”
“Yes, sir, that’s true.”
“And isn’t it true that Corporal Trankic employed his professional skills to convert that alcohol into a whiskey which your section used exclusively for its own consumption?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Then isn’t it understandable how you and Lieutenant Whitter could draw opposite conclusions from basically the same set of facts?”
Docker hesitated because he didn’t know what Karsh was getting at, but he knew that the black whiskey wasn’t the issue here; Karsh had to be laying the groundwork for something else. With no notion of what that could be, Docker shrugged and said, “Yes, I can see how that could happen, sir.”
“Ultimately, of course, it might just be a matter of opinion. Would you agree with that, lieutenant?”
“I suppose I’d have to, sir.”
“I’m not trying to direct or influence your answers, lieutenant. The very purpose of this board is to examine such differences of opinion, gray areas, so to speak, and to try to establish a consensus of truth.”